LX Ventures and Mobio Want You to Get Paid for Being on Twitter

LX Ventures and one of it’s spin-off companies, Mobio INsider, wants “niche social media influencers” to get paid for their twitter presence.

The Vancouver-based startup announced this morning that it has launched the “Be Social. Get Paid.” revenue sharing program.

Mobio expained in a release that it was founded based on “the simple fact, and opportunity, that existing major social networks do not share their advertising revenues with the people who play the biggest part in generating them – the social influencers.” The biggest social influencers (and biggest revenue generators) are “the mainstream celebrities who have very large, and very engaged social media following.”

So, the startup wants to expand its revenue sharing services to niche social media influencers including fashion experts, fitness advisors, business leaders, bands, beauty bloggers, comedians, YouTubers, Vine stars and anyone with an engaged social media following. Mobio said the “Be Social. Get Paid.” program is a “callout to the thought leaders of the social media generation,” and will allow them to get paid for their activity on Mobio INsider.

“Mobio INsider is a very powerful, timely and revolutionary idea for social media today. We believe that social networks should be financially compensating their users for the part they play in the success of the company,” said CEO Mark Binns. “It is on that foundation that we’re executing on our mission to develop the leading social network that pays people based on the content they create and their social influence.”

Binns explained that the company uses a proprietary algorithm to measure engagement. It can seek out influencers with a smaller but highly engaged following that can still yield enough to make a substantial difference. “Some of our niche influencers are paying for lunches, their phone bill or even groceries – just by using social media like they already do, every day. We monetize your social media content for you,” he said.

So, how does Mobio actually make money for followers? It’s all done though advertising, through native banner ads that advertisers will place on a an influencer’s pages, and also through content unlocking. “Basically if you’re a beauty blog and you post a picture or an explanation about some lipstick, we’ll put a mask over it so you can’t see it and it’ll make you watch a seven-second ad to unlock, and when its done you get to see the picture,” said Binns. “We get paid 7-10 cents for the video and we share that revenue with the influencer.” He added that typically Mobio will share the revenue 50/50 with an influencer.

As for who qualifies to be an influencer, Mobio’s algorithm deciphers that. You don’t need a huge following, said Binns, but you need significant engagement. “If you have engagement, we want you on the platform,” he said. Unfortunately my engagement on social media evidently doesn’t cut it. When I allowed Mobio to access my Twitter account, I was informed that I don’t get qualified to get paid, yet. But I can sign up for the newsletter, which I’m super stoked over.

Binns also added that the goal in the future is to make it a self-serve ad platform where most people can be able to monetize their engagement. So maybe there’s hope for me after all.

Joseph Czikk previously has written for the National Post, Montreal Gazette, Vancouver Sun, Regina Leader Post, Techvibes and BC Business Online. Joseph often goes crazy on twitter during NHL and NFL games.

Thanks for sharing the news with us Joseph. The idea is great. Let’s hope the idea has the potential to grow as big as AdSense. In the last 3-4 years, we’ve seen many interesting contextual ad platforms with great ideas not succeeding.

How Influencers view this opportunity would be an interesting question. If this revenue model works out, we will see more spammers trying to squeeze something out of this.